There’s a great e-card that reads: “Dear whatever doesn’t kill me, I’m strong enough now. Thanks.” It was the second most-liked item I posted on my Facebook page. The first was a quote by William Gibson: “Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure you are not, in fact, surrounded by […]
I don’t know if you have noticed, but ever since Robin Williams died, I have removed the filter from my writing that keeps me safe of jaw dropping, disappointing head gestures, and all kinds of judgments that authentic writing invites. I just really don’t care anymore what people think because lives are at stake. If […]
“You,” he said, “are a terribly real thing in a terribly false world, and that, I believe, is why you are in so much pain.” That quote belongs in Emilie Autumn’s psychological thriller novel, “The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls.” It’s the essence, I think, of Robin Williams. He was so real—so passionate, brilliant, empathetic, […]
In his classic bestseller, “Man’s Search for Meaning,” psychiatrist and holocaust-survivor Viktor Frankl explains that among the first things that he had to do once he arrived at Auschwitz was to surrender his clothes. This is humbling in itself, of course. But this was extraordinarily painful for Frankl, because in the jacket of his coat […]
A month into our relationship, my now-husband asked me, “Where do you see yourself in five years?” I didn’t hesitate. “As a nun in a third-world country doing missionary work,” I said. “Interesting.” Somewhere around that time I also told him it would be five years before I slept with him. It was the quickest […]
For a good year or so of my life, I wanted to be Gretchen Rubin, the bestselling author of The Happiness Project. I had coffee with her a few months before our books came out (both were published the first week of January, 2010). Hers became an instant New York Times bestseller. She appeared on […]
Someone recently asked me to write on what I wish people knew about depression, in light of Robin William’s suicide. Here’s my response. I wish people knew that depression is complex, that it is a physiological condition with psychological and spiritual components, and therefore can’t be forced into any neat and tidy box, that healing […]
“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass…It’s about learning to dance in the rain,” wrote Vivian Greene. “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, “I will try again tomorrow,” wrote Mary Anne Radmacher. These are two of my favorite quotes about living with […]
Most people who have been sober longer than a year are asked to give a “lead”—to tell their story. Mine was structurally simple, covering what it was like, what happened, and what it’s like now. Having only drank for three years, my addiction story is pretty straightforward: I stopped guzzling down mood-altering beverages. My depression […]
American poet T. S. Eliot wrote: I said to my soul, be still and wait without hope, for hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love, for love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith, but the faith and the love are all in the waiting. Wait without […]
In his book, “Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart,” psychiatrist Mark Epstein, M.D. tells the famous Buddhist story of Kisagotami and the mustard seed: A young woman named Kisagotami lost her only child to illness around the time of his first birthday. Bereft, she went from house to house in her village, clasping the dead […]
A friend told me the other day to stop overthinking. “Bah ha ha ha!” That’s like telling the pope not to get on his knees, my daughter to stop craving sweets, or a teenage boy not to think about sex. I’ve always wanted to be one of those people who didn’t need a second longer […]
Imagine you had to take a five-year-old with ADHD with you everywhere you went: to work, in the shower, to the grocery, on your run, out with friends. He was always anxious to leave and get back to his xbox at home. On the way to the store, he’d ask, “How long is this going […]
My husband asked me this morning how I slept. I wasn’t sure if I should tell him the truth. Yesterday was a bad day in a string of good days, which feels like a blizzard the first week of April. Aren’t we done with this? By the time we connected at dinner, I had meditated […]
All of a sudden your best friend stops calling. She is no longer wants to join you for yoga on Saturday mornings. The last time you saw her she looked fragile and sad, like someone else was living in her body. Her husband doesn’t know what to do so he solicits your help in cheering […]
The classic poem “Desiderata” says that if you compare yourself to others you will either become vain or bitter. I don’t worry about becoming vain—as my self-esteem is still beneath sea level. But bitterness? That one had a hold of me last weekend. I reached out to a guy with whom I was in regular […]
From the moment my eyes open in the morning until the second that I pull my sleep mask over my face as I go to sleep, I am engaged in battle: I must protect myself with armor against ongoing negative intrusive thoughts that flood into my brain, while sending my prefrontal cortex–the home of logical […]
I used to think once you put down the drink you were fixed, that once you conjured up the courage to quit your addiction, the hard work was over. But addicts are never really cured. Like cancer survivors, they simply stay in remission for the duration of their lives. There is always a person, place, […]
In his book “What Happy People Know,” Dan Baker argues that you can’t be in a state of appreciation and fear, or anxiety, at the same time. “During active appreciation,” Baker writes, “the threatening messages from your amygdala [fear center of the brain] and the anxious instincts of your brainstem are cut off, suddenly and […]
Some of you may recognize my dream, but I like to repost it every now and then to keep it alive and give it legs. In celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr.: I have a dream that one day I won’t hold my breath every time I tell a person that I suffer from bipolar […]
